The guns were beautiful orchestrations of balance and harmony, of circles and curves, of the precise melding of steel and wood in the brilliance of design.
"Ever shoot one of these old Colts, Earl?"
"Of course I have," said Earl.
At least twenty-five of the guns that the Rough Riders had carried up San Juan were displayed in the case, most with long, elegant barrels, the 71/2-inch models that Teddy Roosevelt himself carried. But there were a few others brought in by western lawmen who'd joined the Rough Riders in San Antonio, men who preferred the shorter length of the 45/8 for its quickness in maneuver and deadliness at short range. They were gunfighters, the men who carried those guns, not soldiers.
And ammo. What museum would be complete without the old boxes with their quaint nineteenth-century printing, the cardboard now delicate, the boxes slightly distended for their loads of cartridges inside, huge as robin's eggs, weirdly dense, weirdly serious.
And holsters, too. Of course. Those big flapped things for the cavalry, with the leather over top securing the revolver against the jostle of the animal beneath. But that was not all. Being gunfighters, many of the Rough Riders had their own private rigs, shoulder holsters many of them, to tuck the shorter-barreled Colts away from prying eyes. Earl saw several of fine leather, basketweave-stamped, complex nests of strap and stay and loop and buckle, built to hold the gun just so out of sight that a dexterous man could get it into play in less than a second.
"Okay," said Earl. "I see what you're up to."
"Earl," said Roger, "I just want you to know that men came here, American men, with guns, and fought and died and bled to make this island into something. They were young men, they probably didn't want to die, but they did. And I'm not even going to take you into the disease room, the yellow fever room, and that particular horror. We'll stay here, where we don't have to think about all that dying."
"This ain't right," Earl said. "You are fixing it so that if I say no to you, I'm supposed to be saying no to the men that carried these guns and died on this island. But you ain't them. They are them, and you and Frenchy are something entirely different."
"That is true," said Roger, "and I know you don't care for us and would never see us as their inheritors. You're their inheritor; we're merely little bureaucrats to whom fate has given a responsibility that we hope to hell we can live up to. Well, maybe we can't. I know we can't without your help, Earl."
"Time to stop horseshitting around. This ain't a place for doubletalk. You tell me straight out what you want."
"The island is in play. You've almost gotten killed twice on account of it. Someone sees a destiny for it that isn't free and isn't American. That destiny will grow and grow and maybe sometime down the pike, more American boys with guns will have to land on this island to take it back. You know how many times bigger Cuba is than Iwo Jima?"
"A hell of a lot bigger."
Now Frenchy spoke.
"We have a lot invested in this place. A lot of men died here. It's our blood in the soil as much as anybody's. So we have a moral right to protect it. Now there's a force on the island that means to steal that away and make it something different and foreign. Suppose now, while it's early, we could stop it. Stop it with the big noise of a single shot. Would you have fired a shot in 1938 to kill Hitler? Or in 1940 to stop Tojo?"
"It's always this way, ain't it," Earl said. "Some college kids dream up something and convince themselves it's so right. Then some poor jerk with a gun has to make it happen."
"It is always that way, Earl," said Roger. "That is it entirely. But as annoying as you find us, Earl, you have to admit that we are right."
"You bastards," said Earl, knowing that he had no choice but to sign on, for better or worse.
"It's your call, Earl. We can still make the plane."
"You bastards. Take me to the goddamned hotel. I have to call my wife and make her cry again."
Chapter 27
"You see," explained Ramon Latavistada, "it's not a question of stuff. I can get stuff. I can get any stuff. This is a talent of mine. Excuse, please."
With that he turned and inserted the tip of a scalpel into the eyelid of a prisoner named Hector. Hector was chained to a wall in the bowels of the Military Intelligence Service's Havana location, which was the Morro Fortress. He had been picked up on the recommendation of the political section as a well-known agitator, subversive, pamphleteer, speechmaker and confederate of "Greaseball," as Fidel Castro was known to the SIM.
But Ramon did not plunge the blade into the eye, thereby blinding Hector. What would that have proven? Nothing. Merely that blades cut, blood flows, eyes are vulnerable to violence and the result is exceedingly messy and painful.
Instead, with a deft flick of his wrist, he incised just deep enough into the eyelid to open a small cut that would nevertheless bleed profusely. Since Hector's eyelid was taped open, he could not blink; the blood would flood his eye, and he would have the sensation of drowning in a pool of his own blood, while at the same time facing, by implication, a forever of blindness.
He commented, in Spanish, " Aieeeeeeeeeeee!!!!"
"Hush, hush, my friend," said Ramon.
"You can get stuff," said Frankie, oblivious to the scene. "And by stuff, I suppose you mean contraband. I'm thinking narcotics."
"Yes, of any sort."
"In quantity."
"I have my suppliers, yes."
"The problem then is distribution."
"Well, I would think those concerns would be handled on the other end. My more immediate concern would be importation, protection, intelligence, political allies, essentially the whole apparatus. It takes a skilled operator to set up such an organization. This, my friend, is where I thought you and I could have some conversations."
" Aieeeeeeeeee!! Please! Please, no more, sir!"
"Hush," said the captain. "We are not ready for you yet."
"My eyes! O my god, my eyes!"
"Yes," said the captain in Spanish, "your eyes. Anyhow," he returned to his extremely fluent English, "Senor Carbine, I seem not to get very far with the old men who run your business in America. They have their allies, their connections, their situations all set up. They seem committed to certain groups in Mexico. I suppose the temptation of that long border, so hard to patrol. But if only someone would see: my way is so much better."
"You could move in quantity?"
"Of course. In time, though. All things in time. It would first be necessary to move small test shipments, to make certain the apparatus was adequate. But even in that small step, you see the genius of this business. The product, shipped in pounds, can then be stepped on and turned into hundreds of pounds. From so little, so much. The profits are astonishing. Once people are exposed, they cannot say no. Another thing: when the women are hooked, they will do anything to satisfy their need. Anything. Do you understand what I am saying? I am talking of beautiful women, too. It is amazing, truly."
He turned back to Hector, reinserted the tip of the blade, and administered the next tiny little flick. The results were as desired and designed. Hector jacked in pain and terror. He had a bowel movement. His muscles stood out like ropes against his arms. He bucked and twisted, beyond degradation.
"Ugh," Frankie said, "do they always shit like that? Man, he dumped a ton."
"It's hard to predict. Some do, some don't; you never can tell. All will talk, though. No one can stand the idea of the eye being sliced away, the pain, the humiliation, the infirmity. It always works. It always works, doesn't it, my friend Hector?"
"Please, sir. Please, please, no more, I beg you. I'll tell you anything."